I Went to a Psychic Medium and Spoke to Kurt Cobain

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I've always believed that the veil between this world and the next is thinner than most of us realize. I don't know what happens after we die, exactly, but I know from personal experience that death isn't the end. The night before my grandmother died, for example, I had a dream about my father, who passed away the year before. "Go see your grandmother," he told me. I was long overdue for a visit, so when I woke up, I attributed the dream to granddaughterly guilt. That day I got a call: My grandmother was in the hospital. She died about 20 minutes before I could get there.

Anyway, it's always been said that this veil separating the living and the dead is at its thinnest on Halloween. And after what happened during my session with psychic medium Karen Hollis this week, I understand why.

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The idea was to contact a celebrity on the other side. I chose Kurt Cobain because, like countless other Nirvana fans, I've been haunted by his 1994 suicide for years. Did he manage to escape, in death, the anguish and depression that plagued him in life? And what about Frances Bean Cobain, his now 19-year-old daughter with Courtney Love? She was only 2 when he died. Has he been watching over her all these years?

Based in Connecticut, Karen is the real deal: A clairaudient intuitive, she has clients around the world who swear by her psychic readings; she even assists in missing persons cases.

So I had high hopes for our session, even when Karen warned me that it might not be successful. My request was an unusual one, as people generally want to contact the spirits of their loved ones (who are easy to find because tend to hover close by). Since I didn't know Kurt Cobain personally, there was a chance he wouldn't pick up the phone, so to speak. Plus, Karen admitted to not knowing very much about Cobain. (This ended up working out in our favor.)

Still, the only information Karen needed to get started was Kurt's birthday (February 20th, 1967). Then I just had to tell her what I wanted to know. I began with Frances: Does he regret killing himself and missing his little girl's life?

I was shocked when Kurt responded almost immediately.

"He regrets that Frances never got the chance to know him for who he was," Karen said. "There were two sides to him. She never got to know the softer side ... she's constructed a story in her mind about her father that's not accurate. She's felt limited knowing who she is because of not knowing who he was. He feels badly that she has to live with his legacy, the heaviness of what he did to himself."

Kurt's next message was heartbreaking.

"He felt in life that love was too much hard work. He felt things too deeply ... he ran away from Frances emotionally ... she's part of his soul. He loves her and he's with her ... he's trying to keep her away from trouble."

"He really doesn't want her to get married," Karen said. "He doesn't think it's right for her, he doesn't think she's ready. But he says everybody's gotta do their own thing."

I don't even know how to describe the rest of my session with Karen and Kurt. Things got so intense, honestly, that I was physically shaking for about an hour afterwards. It definitely seemed as if Kurt needed to get some things off his chest (more on that below). But what got me were the moments when Kurt's personality really came through. Like when he lapsed into more abstract, Nirvana lyric-esque language trying to explain the nature of his relationship with Courtney. "I don't expect you to understand," he said. Or when I asked Karen to ask Kurt if he's happy now.

"He's laughing," said Karen. "He says, 'What's happy?'"

He went on to say that he's sad to be remembered for the drugs he did. "He says nobody wants to be remembered for being out of control," said Karen.

"He's laughing again. He says, 'I'm sad I left all that money behind. What was I thinking?'"

I thought it was especially interesting that Kurt told Karen he doesn't usually "do this," but he felt like it was okay to talk to her because she "didn't have any preconceived notions" about him.

That's exactly what made it so mind-blowing for me, too. Karen barely had any background info on Kurt, yet everything she said about him was completely spot-on. There was no question he was speaking through her.

Here's more of what Kurt Cobain had to say:

He doesn't want Frances to go through the same deep depression he did. He wants her to live a "normal" life and not be ruined by money or his legacy. When she passes on, he intends to have a relationship with her. He wishes he could have been there for her.

His issues with Courtney Love are not yet resolved and won't be until she, too, passes over and they're able to have a "conversation." His love for her was a crazy love, he describes himself as a moth drawn to her flame. He says the idea that Courtney could have been in another relationship was unbearable and that she was involved with a friend of his shortly before he died.

The one thing that made him famous, he says, is the very thing that was his undoing: The inability to regulate his emotions. He lived in a "sea of emotions." He's angry that he didn't have "possession of his life," but allowed life to possess him instead.

He's also still angry about people in the music business who stole money from him and later, from his estate (money that belonged to Frances).

Frances is not his only child. He also fathered a son (possibly with a woman named Tiffany), but nobody knows about him.

Besides looking after Frances, Kurt spends his time now helping "obscure" musicians, at least one of whom is poised to make it big with a song Kurt helped him write. (Everybody will say "that sounds just like Cobain," he predicts.)

There is no hell, he says, just a "compassionate source." It is, he says, a "better place," where he's been able to see the "confusion and upset" he caused for the people around him. He regrets not being able to grasp that there was something "greater than himself" when he was alive.

He doesn't want to reincarnate anytime soon. It's "too harsh" here.

At the end of our session, I felt a strong sense of responsibility. Kurt obviously wanted to be heard, and I wanted to help. Part of me wonders if Frances will read this and what she'll think. Of course I can't help but hope her father's words would bring her some level of peace.

They did for me. In fact, I plan on making an appointment with Karen for another reading soon (sessions can be done in person or over the phone; you can find more information on her website).